Kvinna utan ansikte (1947)

The film begins with Martin and Ragnar meeting in a hotel bar. Ragnar learns that Martin is still with Rut, whose identity is not yet known. This troubles Ragnar so much that he even says his evening is ruined. He sees Rut leaving the hotel and hurries to Martin, who is trying to kill himself with a razor. Ragnar stops him. Ragnar recounts Martin’s story in a flashback. Martin was married to a woman named Frida, but began cheating on her with Rut. Martin loves his wife but succumbs to Rut’s charms. When he tries to describe Rut, he remembers all her features, even those he has never seen, except for her face. Rut is “the faceless woman.” Martin is under the spell of her body. A love affair develops between Rut and Martin. Martin gradually neglects his wife without explaining why, although she suspects something is going on. Later, Martin is called up to fight in the war, but he deserts to join Rut. Since Martin is a deserter and wanted by the police, the two lovers live in hiding. Rut manages to get them a place to stay through a chimney sweep she had seduced earlier in the film. Since he is also married, she puts pressure on him so that Martin and she can live in his home. After repeatedly quarrelling, however, Rut and Martin are thrown out. They then live alone on the top floor of an abandoned “castle.” On New Year’s Eve, Rut goes to ask her stepfather, Victor, and her mother for money. Martin and Rut have nothing left. During the confrontation between Rut and her parents, we learn that Victor touched her breasts when she was twelve, a trauma she will never get over. She explains that the incident is like a “monkey” that will never leave her: she will always remember it painfully. Early in the film, when Martin and Rut are seeing each other, there is a hideous portrait of Victor in Rut’s room, painted by Rut. The ugliness of the portrait surely reflects Victor’s moral ugliness; he does not even seem remorseful. This may be another aspect of the “faceless woman”: she seems to have lost some of her humanity after being sexually abused by her stepfather. When Martin learns that Rut went to ask Victor for money, he leaves her despite her pleas. One could almost think Martin is jealous of Victor. Rut tells Martin nothing about her past. That is everything Ragnar knows. The end of the film is the same as the beginning, except that the images show why Rut leaves the hotel and why Martin tries to kill himself: after getting back together with Rut, Martin is left by her. She has remained traumatized by the time Martin abandoned her on New Year’s Eve. Martin begs her: “Before, I loved only your body. Now I love you,” but Rut does not care about his feelings. She is determined to make Martin suffer, and goes back to see the chimney sweep.